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Archive for the tag “Swedish history”

In October of 1611, Karl IX, king of Sweden, died. And no, one should not judge this gentleman by his umm…creative hair-do. Karl was a competent (if rather ruthless) man who used religion as an excuse to wrest the Kingdom of Sweden from his nephew, Sigismund, leaving behind a realm in order, a half-grown son and a rather impressive wife.

The recently bereaved Kristina of Holstein-Gottorp headed the regency council set up to rule Sweden until her son, Gustav II Adolf, came of age. This happened sooner rather than later, the just seventeen-year-old young king deciding in December of 1611 that he was ready to rule on his own, thank you very much. Proud mama acquiesced and so the personal rule of Gustav Adolf began.

Now, one of the things a young king needed was a wife—and heirs. Gustav Adolf probably felt he’d solved that issue some time later. You see, our young and dashing king was in love. Head over heels in love to judge from his surviving letters to Ebba Brahe, who was two years younger than him and one of his mother’s ladies in waiting.

Ebba Brahe was by no means a bad choice. Her family belonged to the upper echelons of Swedish nobility and she was closely related to Gustav Vasa’s third queen (This Gustav was the grandfather of “our” Gustav Adolf). When Ebba’s mother died, the Dowager Queen invited Ebba to court—Kristina had been a close friend of Ebba’s mother and had promised to oversee Ebba’s education. The girl was pleasing to the eye, well-mannered and obviously intelligent, which initially had her finding favour with her new mistress. Until Kristina realised her son had fallen utterly and irrevocably in love with Ebba, pretty and manipulative little minx that she was. This was not good. Oh, no: Kristina had far loftier plans for her son.

Gustav Adolf wooing Ebba

The young king, who lived under the delusion that he could decide who to marry without his forceful mama’s consent, went as far as to offer Ebba marriage. In one of the surviving letters he asks her to raise the issue of impending nuptials with her father. After all, king or not, his bride needed her father’s consent. The reply from Magnus Brahe was a resounding no. He was not about to anger the Dowager Queen by approving a marriage she was so set against—it would make his daughter’s (and his) life hell on earth. Clearly, Kristina of Holstein-Gottorp was a respected woman, fully capable of holding her own among her male contemporaries.

Crestfallen, Gustav Adolf retired to lick his wounds. His mother was unrelenting: Ebba Brahe would not be the queen of Sweden unless it was over Kristina’s dead body. So when Gustav Adolf was next out and about in the world, bringing havoc and fear in his wake as he led the Swedish Army to more victories, he fell under the charm of a married lady and took her to bed. I imagine several people made it their objective in life to inform Ebba of her sweetheart’s betrayal. Maybe that’s why she supposedly engraved “Jag är förnöjd med lotten min och tackar Gud för nåden sin” (I am content with my place in life and thank God for his mercy) on a window. Or maybe this is a case of everyone over-interpreting a young woman’s spontaneous graffiti.

It is more likely that Ebba had long since reconciled herself to the fact that she would never be allowed to marry the man of her dreams. Her future life indicates a substantial pragmatic streak, ironically very much in line with Kristina of Holstein Gottorp’s temperament. Ebba even tried to dissuade her ardent suitor, repeating over and over again that she was not worthy to be Gustav’s wife. It drove him crazy when she said stuff like that, hence him drowning his sorrows in the welcoming arms of another woman. Erm…

Maria Eleonora

With mama cruelly nipping the Ebba-Gustav love story in the bud, Gustav Adolf went on to marry a princess, Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg. His mother was delighted—at first. Over the years, I suspect she came to regret her insistence on having her son wed for dynastic reasons only. The marriage was unhappy, Maria Eleonora was not the most mentally stable of people, and even worse, there were no surviving sons, only a puny little daughter, the future Kristina of Sweden. (One of Gustav Adolf’s big, big plus points is that he seems to have delighted in his daughter, confident she could become as capable a ruler as any man).

Life did not end for Ebba Brahe just because she gave up on Gustav II Adolf. In fact, well before she engraved her famous little quote her father had been approached by the dashing Jacob de la Gardie who had his heart set on Ebba. After some consideration, Ebba accepted his proposal and in 1618 the twenty-two-year-old former royal sweetheart married Jacob.

Jacob was the son of a French wannabe-monk turned condottiere turned royal counsellor and loyal servant of King Johan III of Sweden. Pontus de la Gardie was generously rewarded for his loyal service. King Johan was so fond of Pontus (born Ponce d’Escouperie , but Swedish peeps had a problem with pronouncing such a fancy name) that in 1580 he gave Pontus his own daughter, Sofia Johansdotter, as his wife. The groom was thirty-six years older than the bride but this was no impediment to getting things going, hence baby Jacob was born in 1583 as the third of three children. Sofia expired at childbirth and the sixty-three-year-old Pontus was left alone to raise his children. Seeing as he died some years later, Jacob was orphaned at a very young age and grew up to become an accomplished military commander.

Jacob

By the time he wed Ebba, Jacob de la Gardie had built quite a reputation. After all, he’s one of the few non-Russians who has led a successful campaign through Russia, all the way to Moscow. At the time, Russia was a mess, one faction after the other putting forth their candidate for the new tsar. De la Gardie took advantage of the chaos to strengthen the Swedish position and so admired were his military methods that the young Gustav Adolf spent 1615 campaigning with him to learn the art of war from an expert. At the time, Gustav Adolf was still hopelessly in love with Ebba. At the time, Jacob had already proposed to Ebba. I bet they never discussed that subject over dinner…

Anyway: once wed, Jacob swept his young wife into his arms and carried her off to Reval (present day Tallinn). Jacob was the governor of the Baltic states and constantly busy with his military career. Ebba, therefore, handled their private affairs and estates.

The Jacob and Ebba union is described as being very happy. They complemented each other, with Jacob trusting his wife to capably manage their various investments. She was openly devoted to him and over nineteen years she was brought to bed of fourteen full-term children. Of these, seven would live to adulthood, the most famous being her gallant of a son, Magnus de la Gardie.

Jacob and Ebba settled in Sweden in 1628. Together, they built an impressive empire, featuring everything from palaces such as Makalös (which means Incomparable. It apparently was, which did not always please the king) to successful business ventures.

Ebba excelled at the business side of things. She was especially interested in developing the iron works she owned. Early on, she caught on to the correlation between consistent (and high) quality and premium pricing. The iron produced at the de la Gardie works was of the highest quality. In fact, the iron Ebba sold was so good she was known as Countess Iron – a true iron lady, one could say. This had Ebba laughing all the way to the bank—well, it would have, if our Ebba had not been something of a high spender, with an obvious taste for life’s luxuries. Her clothes, her jewels, her furnishings, the art that decorated her walls – all of it was sumptuous. The de la Gardies also had a huge household. Approximately one hundred people were employed by them to keep their domestic life turning smoothly, plus they had all those palaces to maintain, children to raise in adequate style, horses and dogs and carriages and landscaped gardens, preferably a la francaise. Let me tell you, it was fortunate Ebba had such a well-developed nose for business!

In her business ventures Ebba was supported mostly by one of her daughters, Maria Sofia de la Gardie. Just like her dear Mama, Maria Sofia was possessed of an innate head for business and was one of Sweden’s first industrial entrepreneurs, amassing a huge fortune. That, however, was all in the future when Ebba taught her daughter about USPs and the like.

However, not everything was roses in Ebba’s life. The seventeenth century was not always generous to powerful—and wealthy—women, and in 1651 rumours started making the rounds in Stockholm. The young queen, Kristina, had been spelled by none other than Ebba Brahe, how else to explain the queen’s firm opposition to marriage? Yes, the gossipers whispered, this was Ebba working behind the scenes and using magic to keep Queen Kristina enthralled to Ebba’s much-loved son, Magnus Gabriel de la Gardie, royal favourite par excellence.

We find such accusations mildly amusing. Ebba, however, was probably quite terrified. The accusation of witchery had a tendency to stick like tar. It was therefore fortunate that the accusers in this case were a certain Arnold Messenius and his father, Arnold Johan Messenius. As the elder Messenius had already been convicted of treason on a previous occasion and also came with the stigma of having been educated by Jesuits and potentially being a closet papist, the end result of all these whispers was that Messenius father and son were executed for treason. Ebba could breathe easy again. Well, she would have, had she not had her hands full caring for her ailing husband.

Ebba as a widow

It is somewhat ironic that Jacob de la Gardie, always a man on the move, always involved in one military campaign or the other, should spend his last few years afflicted by a disease that robbed him of his eyesight, thereby making it difficult for him to leave his home. Ebba invested her considerable energies in making his life as comfortable as possible but in 1652 her husband of thirty-four years died, leaving her a very wealthy widow. I dare say she was devastated.

Ebba was to expend the rest of her life on furthering the interests of her children—and more specifically those of Magnus Gabriel—and on expanding her business empire. When she died in 1674 she left behind a considerable fortune and the persisting legend of a young heartbroken girl, who wanted nothing but to marry her king but ended up with de la Gardie instead. I think Ebba would have been most displeased by this: after all, she spent far more years as Jacob de la Gardie’s trusted and respected wife than she did as Gustav Adolf’s heart-throb. But hey, we all have a thing about tragic love stories, don’t we? Even when they’re not one hundred percent true.

There are rune stones mentioning Sigtuna, so we can safely say that today’s stop on our exploration of the lesser-known aspects of Sweden is old. Like very old, even if these days the theories that Sigtuna was founded on a place hallowed to Odin are dismissed as fanciful. Instead, Sigtuna is thought to mean “marshy trading-post”, and while one wonders why on earth anyone would want to build a village on marshy ground, someone back then clearly thought this was an excellent idea. Maybe the proximity to an ancient hill fort helped determine the venue. Or maybe it was the excellent position on the shores of Lake Mälaren, seeing as travelling by boat was the preferred way back then.

Sigtuna today, with the same central street as back then

Whatever the case, by the 980s, Sigtuna was the unofficial capital of Sweden, the then king Erik Segersäll (Erik the Victorious) having declared the former trading post a town. Erik went about his this town thing in a structured manner: he planned one long central street (still the high street of present day Sigtuna), he divided the land in a number of equal sized lots which he stipulated were all to contain four buildings – a shop, a workshop, living quarters & hall – he then gave said lots to people he really wanted to settle in his new town, and, to further promote the image of being a modern king, he invited the Church to establish themselves, probably offering his own soul as bait. “Come here and baptise me,” he might have said, while having no serious intention of ever deserting the old gods.

Now, while all of the above indicates this King Erik really existed, the reason for his epithet is somewhat murkier, but if we dig into Saxo Grammaticus, the Icelandic Edda, the somewhat biased writings of Adam of Bremen and touch all of this up with the fantastic stories told by Olof Rudbeck in the 17th century (Olof had a thing about recreating a very glorious Swedish past) we end up with a story that goes a bit like this:

Erik and his brother Olof became kings together, but unfortunately Olof died and Erik decided there was no need for two kings—he could easily handle the pressure on his own. Olof had a son, Styrbjörn, who for various reasons did not agree. Tough, said Erik, but in compensation he gave his nephew 60 ships with which to explore the world – Viking speak for doing some lucrative raiding.

Styrbjörn took the ships, sailed off to the mythical Jomsborg, home to the Jomsvikings, defeated these, and thereby earned the undying gratitude of Harald Blåtand (Bluetooth) of Denmark who offered to ally himself with Styrbjörn to teach uppity Erik a lesson.

A huge fleet sailed for Sweden, and once there, Styrbjörn set his ships on fire to make it very clear to his men this was a win-or-die day. The Danes had no desire to die on behalf of a crazy Swede, so they refused to burn their ships and sailed back home, leaving Styrbjörn and his (I suppose) somewhat demotivated men to face a very determined Erik. The Battle of Fyrisvallarna was a resounding victory for Erik. Styrbjörn died and everyone lived happily ever after . Well, except for Styrbjörn, obviously.

Where this battle actually took place or even if it took place no one really knows, but a number of rune stones refer to men who died at a big battle just outside of Uppsala (which is close to Sigtuna) so something did go down back in King Erik’s day.

According to some of the sources, Erik was married to a tough-as-boots lady called Sigrid Storråda (Sigrid the Haughty) She was the mother of his sons, one of which was the future king Olof Skötkonung. For some reason, Sigrid and Erik decided to part ways – maybe he found her too overbearing, or maybe she hankered after doing some ruling of her own. Whatever the case, as per the sagas she ended up ruling over a piece of Sweden, and so beautiful and so rich was Sigrid that she was pestered by eager suitors until the day she locked two of them inside a building and burned them alive. For a while there, other suitors thought twice before importuning her with their heated love declarations.

Sigrid and Olav post-slap

Sigrid didn’t care: she had her eyes set on the handsome and powerful Norwegian king Olav Tryggvason, and as he was amenable, the wedding preparations went ahead—until Olav told Sigrid she had to become Christian prior to him wedding her. She refused, he supposedly slapped her and told her he would never lower himself to wedding a pagan bitch. Not the smartest of moves, and in the fullness of time Sigrid would get her revenge, spurring her son and her second husband, Sven Forkbeard, into declaring war on Olav who was roundly defeated and killed at the battle of Svolder in the year 1000. Beware of a woman spurned, hey?

Sigrid would supposedly go on to give Sven Forkbeard one daughter, Estrid. This Estrid would marry Ulf Jarl, brother to Gytha, wife of Godwin of Wessex and mother to Harold Godwinson, and Estrid’s son, Sven Estridsen would be the first in a long, long line of Danish kings.

Unfortunately, this is when I must tell you that Sigrid may be a very colourful lady, but her historical existence is doubtful. There are those who feel the evidence rather points to Erik being wed to a Slavic princess who neither burned eager suitors nor was slapped in the face by Olav Tryggvason, but who definitely gave Erik a son called Olof. Seeing as I’m rather taken by Sigrid, I’m hoping they’re wrong.

One of those churches that popped up

Right: back to today’s subject, which is not the fascinating Sigrid, but rather the equally fascinating little town of Sigtuna. Erik Segersäll was a pagan, and his son Olof Skötkonung was just as pagan – at least initially. But the times they were a-changing, and a lot of pressure was brought to bear on Olof, which was why he became a Christian, supposedly baptised in 1008 by St Sigfrid. As a consequence, churches began to sprout like mushrooms in Sigtuna, which houses some of the oldest church ruins in Sweden. Today, we can wander round the ruins of several of these churches, huge imposing things that served a town consisting of 1000 inhabitants, give or take. Once there were churches, soon enough there were priests. Once there were priests, soon enough there came a bishop, and Sigtuna thereby became an early ecclesiastic centre, a beacon of light in an area where the old Norse faith still held its own.

There is an alternative version of Olof’s baptism: the Anglo Saxon Chronicle tells the story of how King Swein (Sven Forkbeard) and a king Anlaf harried England in 994, pillaging and looting until Ethelred the Unready, as was his wont, bought them off with a huge Danegeld. This Anlaf is by some considered identical to Olof, and as per the Chronicle, Anlaf was baptised at Andover by an Anglo Saxon bishop called Sigeric (a name very similar to Sigfrid, IMO). This would sadly mean no St Sigfrid, but this version is borne out by the fact that already in 995 Olof issued coins stamped with a cross.

Olof was the first Swedish king to issue coins. The mint was set up in Sigtuna, and it was run by an Anglo Saxon gent named Godwine who had some sort of monopoly over the Scandinavian coin-making business, seeing as he was also in charge of the Danish and Norwegian mints. As stated above, already in 995 these coins came decorated with a cross and Olof’s name. Initially, we can assume the people in charge of the minting could read—and move with the times—as Olof is first titled “king of Sigtuna” before becoming “king of Sweden” some years later. Over time, the literacy level among those minting must have dropped severely, as in later periods we have Olof being presented as “king of England”.

Whatever the case, Olof’s conversion to Christianity and his mint were two important steps in moving Sweden away from its Viking past and towards the somewhat more civilised Europe. When Olof died, his son Anund Jacob continued issuing coins, but upon his death the Swedish mint disappeared—at least for a while. It would take almost two centuries before new Swedish coins were issued, and by then Sweden had taken great strides towards a cohesive national state, albeit that the costs had been high – almost constant civil war as one wannabe king after the other tried to grab the crown.

By then, Sigtuna’s heyday was over. In the early 13th century a new town saw the light of the day further to the east, and over time this humble collection of timber houses was destined to become Sweden’s present-day capital, Stockholm. Sigtuna reverted to being a somewhat somnolent place, and only in its many, many ruins of long gone churches and religious establishments can we catch a glimpse of what it was like during those two centuries when Sigtuna was truly the centre of the Swedish world.

I might just as well start out by saying that for very, very many people Sweden is per definition off the beaten track—an insignificant place far to the north with like 10 million inhabitants in a country consisting of 55% forests. Of course, for us Swedes the place is not insignificant: after all, WE live here.

Now Sweden is a very elongated country in which approximately 80% live in Stockholm or south of the capital. This does not mean that the southern part of Sweden is particularly densely populated, but compared to the north, we are positively crowded together, like 25 people or so per square kilometre (I’m being ironic, OK?) Obviously, with all that space, there are plenty of byroads.

One of the many pretty wooden houses to be found in Gränna

This excursion into the (relatively) unknown Sweden starts in Gränna. Once again, everyone in Sweden knows where Gränna is, albeit that not everyone in Sweden has visited this rather cute little town, situated on the shores of Vättern, Sweden’s second largest lake, Vättern. With a protective hillside to the east, the waters of the lake to the west, and a relatively flat space in between. Gränna enjoys a rather nice autumnal climate in which pears thrive. It therefore follows that Gränna pears are a big thing—well, in Sweden.

Visingsö, visible from Gränna

Gränna town was founded in 1652 and has the distinction of being Sweden’s only feudal town, in that it was founded by Count Per Brahe, not by the king. Per Brahe was the richest man in Sweden and I suppose such a man felt he needed his very own town to round off his image. He chose Gränna—at the time a rather obscure village—because of its harbour. You see, until then Gränna was an insignificant little village, no more than a quick stop on the road for all those determined to cross the choppy waters of the lake to Visingsö, an elongated island in the middle of Vättern which in early medieval times was a preferred residence for the Swedish kings.

Why live on an island, one might ask—especially an island so far away from Stockholm. Well, at the time (we’re talking 11-12th century or so), Stockholm did not exist. Plus, being king of Sweden came with the risk of being murdered so that someone else could be elected king, and so retiring to an island seemed the prudent thing to do. Not that it helped Karl Sverkersson, the Swedish king who was brutally murdered in 1167 by his successor, Knut Eriksson. The intrepid Knut had no need to visit Gränna to get to Visingsö – he waited until winter and crossed the lake when it was frozen. He also avoided death by assassin’s blade by the simple expedient of murdering all of Karl Sverkersson’s male relatives he could lay hands on. One little male relative managed to flee: Karl’s three-year-old son, Sverker Karlsson, was smuggled out of Sweden by his mother and would, in the fullness of time, return to wrest the crown from Knut’s sons, but as this has nothing whatsoever to do with Visingsö or Gränna, we won’t go there.

Other than pears and the proximity to Visingsö, Gränna is famous for its “polka pigs”. No, we’re not talking four-legged creatures that go oink in the dark, we’re talking the world-famous Gränna Polkagrisar (polka pigs), which is Swedish for striped stick candy. This contribution to the world’s sweets was invented in 1852 by Amalia Erickson, a young widow who had to do something to support herself and her children. As one does in such tricky situations, she developed a special type of sugar paste which was kneaded on a marble table top and pulled and twisted as it was shaped into a classic red and white swirl. These days, Amalia is honoured all over the place in Gränna, including a life-size statue

Having explored Gränna to the full, we drove off towards Rök, home to 185 souls, give or take. Not that we were going to see the inhabitants. Nor were we all that interested in the church, built in the mid 19th century atop the demolished ruins of a 12th century church. IMO, I’d have preferred to see the old church, but the people living in Rök a century or so ago desired a new place of worship, airy and filled with light, and so they happily destroyed the old to give room for the new, a process called progress for which we must have some respect as otherwise we would all still be living in wattle and daub cottages without running water or central heating.

Well over 2 metres tall, behold Rökstenen

Now, outside the old medieval church there used to be a tithing booth, and fortunately for all of us, those men so determined to rebuild the church in the 19th century were wise enough to salvage the truly impressive runestone that our medieval ancestors had walled into the tithing booth as a nice, robust foundation. This, dear peeps was what we had come to see: Rökstenen, one of the most well-preserved and impressive runestones still around.

The inscription on Rökstenen is the longest known rune inscription and dates from the early 9th century. It is thought it was originally placed close to where it now stands, right by the side of the processional road which all newly elected kings would travel as part of their inauguration process. By placing the stone there, the grieving Varin, father of the dead Vämod in whose honour the stone was erected, ensured his son’s name would never be forgotten. Given that we still know his son’s name, more than 1200 years after his death, I guess Varin succeeded.

When the Christian church began establishing itself in the region the stone was toppled – you know, out with the old heathen stuff, in with the new Christian things – which is how it ended up as building material. Fortunately, the stone was never defaced, and so we can still read (but not necessarily understand) the convoluted inscription in which Varin laments the loss of Vämod

From the runestone it was but a short drive to Alvastra. Once one of the more important monastic houses in Sweden, today Alvastra is a peaceful collection of ruins, the original layout clearly visible. The monks who founded Alvastra were invited here by King Sverker (dad to Karl Sverkersson who was murdered on Visingsö), which is why in 1143 a group of monks left Clairvaux In France and made the long and perilous journey to this distant backwater. One can only imagine just how unpopular these poor monks must have been to be sent off into the wilderness, to a place where Christianity was still a novelty. Forty years after arriving, the proud monks consecrated their abbey church, built in local limestone. Some 400 years after the monks’ arrival, Alvastra disappeared as a religious community , the impressive library, the silver and relics carted off to Stockholm and the new, Protestant king’s treasury.

After some time imbibing the serenity of Alvastra, off we went to Vadstena, one of the holier places in Sweden – well, at least according to St Birgitta, who founded the Brigittine order here. To be quite correct, St Birgitta was only present as a bag of bones when the convent was opened, seeing as she’d died in Rome after having nagged the pope into allowing her to start a religious order in which both men and women were welcome (albeit living in separate dormitories) In general, St Birgitta was a very determined lady who managed to browbeat almost everyone into doing what she wanted, which was how she harassed the pope into leaving Avignon behind and moving back to Rome. Yes, she was also very devout and had been afflicted by religious visions since the tender age of six, and yes, she believed in helping the poor and needy – especially the women. More about St Birgitta can be found here – and I hasten to add that just because she was canonised, this does not mean St Birgitta was all that soft and cuddly. Rather the reverse, in fact.

In the abbey church of Vadstena lie the mortal remains of another medieval lady, Philippa of England, Queen of Norway, Denmark & Sweden. While St Birgitta inspires reluctant admiration, little Philippa mostly inspires compassion. She was sent off at the tender age of twelve by her father, Henry IV of England, as a bride to the (at the time) very distant north. From little Philippa’s perspective, her father was more or less sending her to the “here be dragons” part of the map. Not so from her daddy’s perspective, seeing as Henry IV (prior to usurping his cousin’s throne, i.e. when he was still plain old Henry of Bolingbroke) had spent a lot of time fighting for the Teutonic Order in the Baltics.

Erik of Pomerania

Philippa was married to Erik of Pomerania, heir to the combined thrones of Sweden, Norway and Denmark, By all accounts, Philippa did a great job managing Sweden for her husband, so much so that while the Swedish nobles heartily disliked Erik, they always respected their little queen. Unfortunately, Philippa died young and childless, and soon enough the Swedish nobles threw Erik out, leaving the ex-king no other option but to become a pirate (!) with the Baltic Sea as his hunting ground. Maybe a story for another day.

Vadstena is not only famous for its religious history. Long before St Birgitta decided to house her convent here, Vadstena was a favourite residential town for the Swedish medieval kings, home to one of their most luxurious palaces. Seeing as Birgitta strong-armed the then king, Magnus, to grant her the palace for her future religious establishment, there is little left of the palatial interiors – and truth be told, they’d only be palatial from a medieval Swedish perspective. Magnus’ wife, Blanche of Namur, was probably less than impressed by the comforts offered by her Swedish residences, comparing them unfavourably with the palaces of her childhood in present-day Flanders.

Blanche with Håkan

As to why Magnus chose to give Birgitta his royal residence, I suspect he did that to stop her from insinuating he was more into men than women and that his son, Prince Håkan, was the consequence of the fair Blanche of Namur finding pleasure in other arms. See? I told you being a saint doesn’t necessarily mean being nice.

Finally, we could not leave Vadstena without at least mentioning Princess Cecilia, the party princess who in the late 16th century was discovered entertaining a scantily clad young man in her bedroom. Most unseemly, and the scandal so angered dear papa the young man spent a long, long time cowering under the shadow of the gallows before papa relented and decided to have his wayward daughter wed the intrepid lover. Cecilia’s life would end up being one very long adventure, including such highlights as fleeing England due to unpaid debts and dabbling in piracy to balance the books.

Strolling along the Lake Vättern in Vadstena. The abbey church can be seen to the right through the trees

After all this sightseeing, a longish human break was in order before setting off due north, towards the not-so-well-known town of Sigtuna. More about this little gem in my next post!

P.S. A quick note: Sweden in the early medieval period was substantially smaller than it is today. The southern part belonged to Denmark, the north was unchartered terrain, and to the west large chunks of present day Sweden belonged to Norway.